Latest Technology Innovation Research

Phocuswright has tracked
the launch of more than 80 travel-focused accelerators, incubators, early-stage
investors and entrepreneur support programs in the last 5-7 years, not to
mention dozens of pitch competitions, hackathons and conferences, including our own. Each promises to connect travel
startups with a combination of industry expertise, resources, capital and
exposure, and contributes to what is now a robust travel startup support
ecosystem. These programs and entities have sprung from intermediaries,
suppliers, destinations, investors and independent groups.

Virtually everyone on the planet who has used the internet recognizes
the three leading search engines, Google, Yahoo and Bing. Along with the big 3,
there are several others, such as the Chinese search engine Baidu and DuckDuckGo,
which does not track and record users’ actions. Despite these advances, we have
just begun to unlock the potential of search.

Transportation and travel. Travel and transportation. For
obvious reasons, the two cannot be treated as mutually exclusive. Both are
being transformed by ever-hastening technological advances, and though the
naysayers dismiss the likelihood of total disruption, one has only to look at
other technological leapfrog moments: the Ford Model T, Southwest Airlines,
Apple’s iPhone, Uber. In each of these instances, mass adoption occurred because
of a disruptor, and once that disruptor entered the market, adoption took place
in fewer than 10 years. History is about to repeat, and it will once again
involve how people get around. Many predict this change will be the most transformative
one in transportation for the next 100 years. This analysis will explore various
aspects and implications of this transformation on the travel industry.